abuse in the home

Yes, psychological abuse is another way of talking about emotional abuse. However, using the term “psychological” can help us break down the facts about how this type of abuse occurs.

How is it psychological?

Psychological abuse is a repeated interaction between two people, in which one person attacks the other’s self worth, social competence (as a mother, child, sibling or worker), and makes that person believe that they are unwanted, unloved, and deeply flawed. When the psychological attacks become routine, the relationship can be defined as abusive.

Psychological abuse is then exactly what it sounds like: an attack on your psyche. Although some people will write this type of abuse off as “still better than being hit,” it is important to see how psychological abusers aim to twist how you see yourself, to the point that they tell you who and what you are. This is a terrible theft of identity, which can make it incredibly hard for you to break from the image of you that the abuser has created.

When overcoming psychological abuse in your life, you must identify this image of yourself and destroy it: if you don’t, you will continue to go through life seeing yourself through your abuser’s eyes, assuming that you are inadequate and undeserving, which can deeply hurt your future relationships.

It is also important to remember that it is the long term psychological effects that can be most damaging in a physically/sexually abusive relationship. Although physical damage eventually heals, the psychological damage that comes with it can take years to overcome.

Something else to keep in mind is that psychological abuse affects many households. According to Facts Court Watch, out of 504 children, 29% had been emotionally abused by caregivers compared to the 9% who had been sexually abused and the 14% who had been physically abused. Facts Court Watch also points out that children who are exposed to marital abuse in the home are affected as if they had been directly psychologically abused.

“Crazy Making” & “Gaslighting”

“Crazy making” is how many people describe an abuser’s tendency to mix abusive behavior with “breadcrumbs” of love and affection, which keeps the victim hanging on for better times by ensuring that the abuser is capable of love (conditional, of course, on the victim being “good”). Another aspect of psychological abuse to keep in mind is “gaslighting.” Here’s a definition from Facts Court Watch:

Perpetrators of emotional/psychological abuse often consciously employ a strategy called, “gaslighting” in which they present an alternate reality to their victims, police, therapists and judges. Gaslighting involves denying what occurred, offering plausible but untrue accounts of what occurred, or suggesting the victim is imagining things, exaggerating or lying. Gaslighting strategies leave victims doubting their own perceptions, memory or sanity and serve to confuse police, judges and therapists into inaction or worse, supporting the abuser, while leaving the victims feeling helpless and alone against the abuse (Forward, 2003; Engel, 2002, Stern, 2007).

It is important that you educate yourself in the possibility of manipulation by other person. This will prevent you becoming a victim of other person’s abusive intentions…

Here you can find what each of the lessons in this course are about. Keep in mind that each of these lessons has extra tools to use, too, as well as a way of sharing your comments with others!

Lesson #1: Basic Ideas About Abuse

What if there was a new way of thinking about abuse that gave you power instead of taking it away? Of seeing yourself as a champion instead of a victim? Once you start talking about all that your abuser has taken away from you, you lose the critical skills you need to stop emotional abuse. What you instead need are the tools to see your life as yours, not your abuser’s, and that what he has taken from you is your confidence, not your power.

Lesson #2: Framing Abuse as Control

Why do people abuse others? Why does your abuser abuse you? These are questions you’ll need to answer as you begin thinking about how you’re going to put a stop to the emotional abuse in your relationship. There are some very simple concepts about an abuser’s mindset that will help you understand how little about you abuse is, and how insecure your abuser really is.

Lesson #3: The Price You Pay for Emotional Abuse

It’s also critical that you learn what can happen if you decide to “ride it out.” The time for passiveness has passed; now is your time to see your situation for what it is. You will understand what your abuser has tried to take from you, how he has tried to crush you, by taking a realistic look at what awaits anyone who stays under the toxic influence of emotional abuse.

Lesson #4: Do You Fight or Leave?

Many will tell you to just give up on your abuser. We don’t. We accept that many women will want to do all they can to stay with their abuser, whether out of love, loyalty, financial difficulty, or mutual children. What we give you here is a breakdown of how you can stop emotional abuse both in and out of a relationship (that is, whether you fight abuse in the home, or fight it by leaving). Each of these options is harder than it seems, and that’s why you need a checklist of the preparations and precautions you need to keep in mind.

Lesson #5: Recovering Your Best Self

Only you know how deeply hurtful emotional abuse has been for you. Your personality will determine how long it will take to recover from the shock of being abused by a loved one. Although each person’s recovery time is different, there is a process that each person must take in order to recover critical aspects like self-esteem, self-love, confidence, strength, and the ability to stop abuse when or if it occurs again.

Lesson #6: Fulfilling Your Life Mission

Your last task in overcoming emotional abuse is to halt the worst effect of abuse: the idea that you need your abuser to make you a real person. With a strong sense of what you want from life, and how you’re going to get it, you can become a person who is strong and tall as a castle wall – abuse can’t break through your protective barriers! You will no longer give any thought to those people who try to tell you that you’re nothing without them.

This is a new course in overcoming emotional abuse, made specifically for women who are in emotionally abusive relationships, and don’t know where to turn for help. This course is the continuation (part 2) of our new book, called Healing from Emotional Abuse. If you have not read this book yet, we highly recommend that you read this book before taking the course, as it will introduce you to concepts that will be helpful to you.

When you register, this book is included in the price of your registration

In this course, you will receive in-depth lessons on both the basics of emotional abuse and the harder aspects, such as leaving and protecting your mental health. Each lesson is a way for you to both learn more about the toxic abuse in your life, and respond to us with your concerns, doubts and struggles (each lesson has a private survey at the end for you to participate in).

We made this course because we believe that no matter how strong a woman is, she can be crushed by emotional abuse’s toxic barrage of:

Membership in our forum, where you can support and be supported by other women taking the course

Online webinars given by Coach Nora.

Private phone coaching with Dr. Nora

New materials provided each month to keep you growing and thinking!

Through this course, you can take a deep look at your life and your abuse situation, and make the important decisions you need to make regarding the future of your marriage, your emotional well-being, and how you want to stop the emotional abuse in your life.

Are you wondering how Healing Emotional Abuse + the Overcoming Emotional Abuse course will help you? It’s simple.

You may start here…

But you can end up here!

Make no mistake: this course will change your relationship. If you’re willing to put this course into practice, you will have the tools you need to stop emotional abuse. You may decide to leave, or decide to stay, but you will no longer have the same attitude about your life. You will demand respect as a human being, deny humiliation and control attempts, and fulfill your need to be deeply appreciated and loved. You will be given the tools to seek out the life that you want, and happily pursue it! Here is the link to the Overcoming Emotional Abuse Course: